Running
by Wholocked221
Summary: Contrary to all of the times he had almost died, faked his death, and pretended his was dead, Gabriel the Archangel hadn't ever actually died before. He wondered, while he was alive, what awaited him after death. After death, in Gabriel's twisted afterlife, he found a new home, because Heaven sure as Hell wasn't anymore.


**Author's Note: This was supposed to be a happy piece about how Gabriel's not dead which he isn't, but it was sort of a downward spiral and then this happened. Dark! or Depressed!Gabriel depending on how you choose to read it.**

Gabriel had been getting used to being dead.

He'd been dead for quite awhile, but he couldn't exactly tell time. When you're dead, time's weird. Like, really weird. He could have been dead hours, days, weeks, years, or maybe even centuries. Time was different, too, in Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory, he gathered. Hell if he knew. But he did know that he was indeed dead as a doornail thanks to big brother Luci, and he did know he was getting used to it. When angels died, it was a peculiar thing. They weren't humans, so they didn't go to Hell. In fact, they couldn't. Hell rejected every pure thing it could. And by definition, angels - especially archangels - were pure things. Pure beings. But Gabriel was different. There could be a Hell in store for him.

Angels weren't human, so would they go to Purgatory to fight for their 'lives'? Fight against all of the monsters and all of the creatures that the Big Man Upstairs rejected? Possibly. Would they go to Heaven? Heaven was their home. Would the dead angel's 'soul' bounce back up top? Gabriel didn't know. Contrary to all of the times he had almost died, faked his death, and pretended his was dead, he hadn't ever died before. Gabriel the Archangel was a strange creature, a strange being. A pagan archangel. Did angels have Judgement, too? Would their Judgement define where they went, if their even was such a thing? If so, Gabriel the Archangel didn't have much hope for himself. He'd skipped out when all of the fighting his family had done had gotten to much for him. He'd stuck himself in his own private witness protection program, getting a face transplant, and calling himself the Trickster god, Loki. Did he deserve Heaven with all he'd done? Could he even come back to his home? Was it even that anymore? Did he even really want to? It had been so, so long seen he'd been home. So very long. Sometimes, he secretly longed for his old home, but he wasn't sure he still had one.

He didn't know. For once in his life, the Trickster god Loki, the archangel Gabriel, didn't know what awaited him.

So when he died, after he'd gotten over actually _dying_ he began to wonder about his fate. Was there a life after death for... disobedient archangels? Did a Heaven await Gabriel? A burning Hell? A cleansing Purgatory? He got his answer once he'd really and properly died.

D. All of the above

His soul, his grace, his broken vessel, floated between all 3 options. There was no peace, no single space for the dead archangel to co-exist with all of the other dead things in the history of creation. He drifted, he flew, he ran. He existed.

There was a hell of a lot of running in this afterlife for archangels, and then a hell of a lot of nothing.

Gabriel spent his time in Heaven running. He didn't have a Heaven, as no angels did. The humans have their Heavens, and he skips though them. So he spent his dead-time as he referred to it in Heaven running through them. He ran through the famous Heavens, and he ran through the Heavens of the average humans. He ran through so many Heavens, so many, that they tended to blur together. Being dead kinda sucked in a lot of ways, one being that he really couldn't use his powers. He ran from Michael, for a while. Michael would use him as a weapon, pulling him into the battle he so desperately sought to stop, to finish, to do something. Until the Winchesters finally stopped the Apocalypse, Gabriel just wanted it to end. But sometimes, sometimes, he forgot. He forgot about everything, and he ran. He ran from God's ever-present presence in Heaven, even though Dad had been gone for literal ages. He ran from his brothers, his mundane, normal brothers, by angel standards. His brothers who were thrust into a war that they probably did not want either. He almost felt sorry for them. Almost. They had no idea what had become of him as soon as he left Heaven. They hadn't seen him since. They might be on a side. They might force him onto a side. And even though he'd almost chosen one before his death, he disliked that greatly. He still almost felt sorry for them. He hid well, and he kept hiding. Hiding and running. Heaven didn't feel like home, not anymore. Heaven felt like Hell.

He spent his time in Purgatory running. He ran from the Leviathans who remembered who he was. They resented him for not having saved their sorry asses. They somehow knew he didn't have his powers while dead, and they came after him. It felt cleansing, however. It felt like every moment he spent in Purgatory was scrubbing away the wrongs scratched, etched, carved deep into his sorry soul, marred and punctured and stained by his sins. He hated the feeling. He could never be clean, could he? He was scarred. Broken. A lost case. Nothing could fix his twisted, broken soul. He had given up many years ago, and he resented Purgatory for trying to cleanse him. Didn't it know it was wasting its' time? He was a lost cause, a cause lost so very long ago. That was its' purpose, was it not? Purgatory was essentially a prison for the defective, a concentration camp for the broken, cleaning them. Gabriel ran from the vampires, the werewolves, the wendigos, the djinn, all of the monsters under the bed, and he ran from his own soul. He ran, ran, ran. Purgatory almost felt like home. But still, it felt like Hell.

He spent his time in Hell doing all manner of things, most of them being running. Running and hiding and screaming and crying and waiting and not running.

He spent his time in Hell screaming. He, the fearless archangel warrior Gabriel that had smote so many demons that his kills were literally uncountable, was tortured. The spirits of his kills and the anxious-to-join demons that were not known to him attacked him viciously again and again. They killed him in all of the ways he had killed them, countless times and again, and in worse ways that the angel had almost ashamedly thought of already. He had time. He was made of time. Made of time and a dark spirit.

The untouchable archangel warrior Gabriel, the celestial weapon of the Heavenly Host, spent his time in Hell crying. He cried out for his father, God. He cried out for the Almighty God to rescue him. From all that had happened, a part of him, a childish part, still believed in his Father. In the moments when he cried, sticky tears dripping down his cheeks, salt painting portraits of his anguish, he was not as dark. He was a child again, in those moments. He cried out for his brother. He called out for Lucifer. Despite all the pain the Devil had caused, despite killing even Gabriel himself, the youngest archangel still was willing to welcome his dear older brother back with open arms should he wish to return. He cried out for his big brother to rescue him from the pain and the darkness that consumed him. Hell made him almost his old self again. His very, very old self.

The viscous archangel killer Gabriel, the archangel with no mercy or soul, that feared no one or nothing, spent his time in Hell running. When he escaped the clutches of the demons, - or they let him go to have fun catching him again. He never figured that out. He wasn't sure he wanted to. - Gabriel ran. He didn't run as fast as he had in Heaven, and he didn't run as fast as he had in Purgatory. Part of him, a small part, wanted the demons to kidnap him again. That small part wanted to cry, wanted to scream, wanted to feel pain. That small washed-up part of a dark spirit wanted to be its' very old self again. That small part didn't want to be dark. So sometimes, Gabriel let them catch him. Sometimes, Gabriel did not run. Sometimes, that small piece of him, that tiny portion of the very old Gabriel took over. It did not care of the pain it caused the rest, wanting to feel like itself again.

Hell didn't feel like Hell. Hell felt like home.

So, Gabriel the Archangel was used to being dead.

**Author's Note 2: What have I done... Reviews, follows, and favourites are appreciated but not expected. :)**


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